Absolutely.

So, here's how my face looked this morning.

It got steadily worse throughout the day...

I couldn't move my face at all.

But everybody told me I looked scary as fuck. Not in those words, due to workplace environment, but I was a bit bummed, as that wasn't the point.

Oh, well.

I came right home and washed it off. It took ten minutes to get rid of it all, and I look scarier now than I did before:

But it feels fucking radical to have all of that shit off of my face. It took an hour. I did get quite a lot of compliments on it. It didn't look anywhere NEAR as good as the picture I saw of it on the internets, but that's ok. I didn't totally fail at it, so I think I can write this one down as a win.

Amber and I are going to watch Addams Family Values tonight. I will also be finishing my paper. Oh boy.

Climb in bed beside me, we can lock the world outside

I have to dress up for work tomorrow, so I'm going to be a broken doll. Which means waking up two hours early to do my hair and makeup. I'm both excited about this, and dreading it. I'm only going to get five hours of sleep. Damn.

I'll hopefully have some photos to put up tomorrow. Nothing fancy, just shit from work.

I wish I had more interesting things to say. I just haven't felt very interesting for the last couple of weeks.

I park my car outside your house, hoping someday you'll come home

So, here's the scoop:

I am doing homework, drinking bourbon whiskey because I drank all of my rum and whiskey is Allen's drink, and watching The Mindy Project.

Since it's midnight, I'd say the evening is an obvious success.

I'm trying to find more places to break into and photograph. I MAY have found some people to bust into the Longmont Sugar Mill with me. Maybe even Gilman. Both places come with the high probability of being arrested. I don't even mind. I have such a high desire to see these places and photograph them that the pros outweigh the con.

Tomorrow night, right after class, I'll be zooming home to play the closed Fable Legend Beta. I. Am. SO. Fucking. EXCITED. I'll only get to play for 2.5 hours, but I'll be in every beta from here on out. And that's all I can say about it. Which blows.

I have to get back to my homework, and then I get to spend Friday, Saturday, and Sunday doing homework, too. My brain is exhausted.

HOLY FUCK I AM DRUNK

Amber and I had our date night. The following things happened, and I am not responsible for my face.

We had a fucking great time. We drank too much, laughed too loud, and took our first pictures "together" in eight years. Even though I'm still pretty damn wasted, I am super pleased I had tonight to unfuckingwind. I was way, way stressed, and super sad, and I feel much better now.

Stories often outlive their authors; especially the good ones

I finished up my homework, but there was one answer in my hours of psychology homework that I just couldn't get right.

I apparently have a lot of learning to do when it comes to psychology. They have all of these fancy terms, like telepathy. Welp.

Paul! You is a wharrwilf!

I saw two amazing things tonight, within five minutes of each other.

A very large owl was perched atop my roof, and I didn't notice him until a second before he flew off. But he was huge and beautiful.

Minutes later, I saw the most spectacular meteorOID I've ever seen. IT was huge, and bright, and it looked like someone striking a match against the sky. I always go out and view the meteor showers....few things in this life give me greater pleasure. I drive out either to my spot at Garden of the Gods, or I go to Manitou Lake (which is EXCEPTIONALLY creepy late at night. IT would be creepy if I had company; going out there alone is fifty times worse). I have never seen such a brilliant flash of fiery, doomed rock. Something something something humbled something something.

Those things happened. I was there.

Since it's October, Allen and I are watching horror movies, when I have the time. Which isn't often, maybe once or twice a week. We would have watched one or two on Sunday, but I spent twelve hours (I only wish that were an exaggeration) doing homework instead. I needed to concentrate.

I'm in bed writing this. I'm about to fall asleep without a book on my face, which is a marked improvement from this afternoon.

As an aside that's not even related to anything I wrote about....

I may not care for Maroon 5 circa now. I may feel like Adam Levine looks like the kind of dude that is definitely going to give you the clap. But I will always have several soft spots for older Maroon 5 songs (Songs About Jane is still one of my favorite CDs to listen to). Not a single spot is as soft as the one I hold for this:

Go, then; There are other worlds than these.

It's been an interesting few days.

Last night was my last night of class for the week. It was kind of an emotional lecture. We did this exercise on privilege, and it hit a lot of nerves. Not in a bad way, but in the good, eye-opening kind of way.

I have a project that's due on Monday on fallacies. I've started the research bits of the project, and I'm positive I'll be able to finish the project in a spectacular fashion by Monday morning at 8:30. I'm essentially teaching everybody about fallacies (well, a fallacy in particular. But it has a huge amount of sub-fallacies, so there's that). I'm quite good at speaking in front of others. I'm not concerned.

I AM concerned about my Human Geography test. I'm hoping to finish my project by tomorrow night so I can buckle down with those chapters (all fucking five of them) and ace this thing. I got a 65 on the first test. I could have taken it again, but I opted not to. I earned the grade, and I generally do try and stick with what I deserve. I DID get a 60/60 on my paper, which obviously pleased me. That textbook is so god damn boring. I love listening to my professor lecture, but that's probably because she doesn't really lecture from the book. Which, in case you were curious, helps me not at all when trying to do my tests.

I also got a 55 on my last quiz in sociology. But, in fairness, I didn't read a solid twelve pages out of the chapter, because it focused only on rape, and I just didn't want to. I wrote her a little note on the top of my quiz about it. I didn't expect leniency, I just wanted to her to understand why I've gone from 90s and 95s to a 55.

I stopped blogging this morning so I could go to work. As soon as I got home from work, I turned right around to meet up with my very favorite past professor, Miss Kitty. We had a delightful time, and sat and chatted and caught up for two hours. I love her so much. She's kind of the mother I wish my mom could have been to me. I would never tell her that, nor would I tell my mother. But it's true just the same.

Allen and I watched a comedy documentary last night called Mortified Nation. It's possibly the best representation I've seen on how alike and connected every single one of us are to each other. It was an absolute joy to watch, and I'd like to watch it again.

I received a response from TESSA today about volunteering for them. They've finished their orientations for the year, BUT she did read the essays I submitted (my question answers became essays. I had a lot to say), and she'd like for me to come in and do an interview, and become a bit more acquainted with the facility and what they do. She told me that the schedule for orientation comes out at the end of the month. I haven't responded yet, but I would like all of these things. I was quite pleased.

Stevie bought me the most gorgeous scarf. I've been wearing it constantly. Today is no exception. I'm about to run a few errands, and I'm wearing my favorite black leather jacket, my absolutely delicious scarf, my bird tee, and my skinnies with the holes in them. With heeled booties. I must say, I look wonderfully fucking foxy. Fuck yeah, Target! You know you want this.

....It should be noted I'm dressing up for nobody other than myself. This is absolutely fine for me, but uh...well, there we are.

As soon as I get home, it's best friend date night with Amber. We can't decide if we're watching My Big, Fat, Greek Wedding or Labyrinth. I have to remember to buy more booze. Fridays are my new favorite night. They're the best.

The minor fall, the major lift

Today was an exceptionally hard class day.

We talked about the reasons that rapes go unreported (as rape is one of the index crimes that is high on the scale of not being reported upon), and I sort of clenched my body into itself and remained silent, and I cried just the slightest bit. I had discussed this with my professor the second week of class, letting her know that I  may not be present during our class session pertaining to rape (we have an entire chapter on it, and since this class is very discussion heavy, I told her I may not be able to handle it). She's loosely aware of my situation. At the end of the discussion today, she gave me a thumbs up and a smiled and mouthed, "you did great".

When we came back in from break, we watched a documentary about domestic violence, and women who had suffered domestic violence until they killed their husbands. The documentary itself was heartbreaking, but to divide the movie in half, there was a sound clip cut in, played against a black screen. The sound clip is of a frantic little boy, I'm guessing he was no older than five, but I could be off by a year either way telling the cops to send help because his mommy and daddy were having an argument. As the dispatcher is telling him someone is on the way, he starts sobbing, and he tells the dispatcher his daddy just punched his sister to the ground. As the call progresses, the little boy starts crying harder and harder, until he finally screams and says his daddy just stabbed his mommy in the neck, and the dispatcher is telling him to stay on the phone, and you can hear the phone drop, the dispatcher says hello one more time, and then the line goes dead. It was, by far, the most horrifying thing I've heard in a long, long time. I didn't cry while I watched the documentary, but the second I got into my car after class, I lost it.

I am not what anybody would call maternal. I've had two children; my daughter is eleven and she lives with her father. I gave up custody of her when she was six. I haven't seen her since she was one and a half, and I haven't spoken to her since she was five. This brief description of my relationship with Rhyann does not do any kind of service to explaining the events that took place and why they happened the way that they did. But that's the situation in a nutshell. I also have a seven year old son. My relationship with Gabriel was....and still is....rocky. My involvement with my son has gotten better over the last two years, because for some crazy reason, that little kid loves me. I want to deserve it. I don't understand why he does, but he does. I'm not cruel to him, I don't ignore him, I just...I'm not a stereotyped ideal of a mother. I work, sometimes two or three jobs at a time. I got to school full time. I have studying to do. Sometimes, SOMETIMES, I have a very small social life that starts up right after he goes to bed, so I'm not around for all the jumping out of bed to get water, and sometimes, I'm out studying with my study group until one or two in the morning, so I'm not always around for the nightmares, either. Trying to better myself and create myself and find myself doesn't leave much room for me to be maternal. And to top it all off, I never wanted kids to begin with. I don't particularly like children. Don't get me wrong, I love my son. I love my daughter, as far removed from me as she is. Gabriel has gotten exceptionally interesting in the last two years, and I've gotten to the point where I LOVE spending time with him. I will, when I can afford to slack off, take him for adventures. We have discussions about science, and astronomy, and as frustrating as it is, I'm teaching him the things I know about the world and its components. I've started teaching him how to use my camera. I'll go out and take pictures of him. Derek and I take him out with us sometimes.My kid is razor sharp (I have the tests to prove it!This isn't just mom bragging. My kid is damn near genius level smart), he's funny, and he's a little asshole in exactly the same way that I'm a large asshole. The only difference is I'm thirty, and he's seven. He's snarky and sarcastic, and a whole heap of trouble. But he's also the sweetest fucking kid ever. Somehow, someway, I managed to help raise a little boy that can make fun of the world while being incredibly empathetic to it at the same time.

When I heard that little boy crying on the phone, I thought of my son. I thought of the terror the poor little boy witnessed, and I felt afraid for the things my son may see, or hear, and I wanted to make sure that he never had to feel that fear for me. Or because of me.

I haven't ever been blind to the terrible things that go on in the world. I know that people have the capacity to act upon the wild, animalistic, cruel desires they harbor, and sometimes, they carry them out. About six years ago, I decided I wanted to stop just knowing about them. Knowledge is nothing unless you do something with it. I began participating in my community. I volunteer with quite a few organizations, and I'm attempting to get into more to branch out my volunteer work. Domestic violence is one I've stayed away from. Not intentionally, it just hasn't been on my radar. I don't think this is the sort of thing I can sit idly by with anymore.

That little boy may not have made it through that night alive. His mother may not have, either. But no little child should ever have to be afraid for his mother, or his father, or his siblings. Nobody should live in fear of anybody. All too often, sufferers of domestic violence suffer silently and alone. I can't fucking swallow that idea. I want to help. The most interesting thing about college for me hasn't been what I've learned, it's been what I want to do with that knowledge. Every week, there's something else I want to devote time to doing.

The world needs to change. It needs to change so, so much. When I discussed all of this with Allen tonight, sobbing to him about how this made me feel, and how I can't in good conscience sit idly by, he told me that the saddest thing is, no matter what you do, you can't even begin to make a dent in things like this. But I call shens. I CAN make a dent, and I will. Even if that dent is one person, it's something. It's better than standing with a group of my friends and saying things need to change. I can affect that change. I will affect that change.

I recognize that I don't have a lot of time for things. Even in the grand scheme of my life, I don't have enough time. I can't touch on everything that matters to me, but I can sure as fuck give it a try. How I'll attempt to go about helping in this regard eludes me. But I'll start by seeing what's in this area, and what time I can afford to devote to it.

I don't miss the old me one bit. I have changed and grown and evolved so much, sometimes I don't recognize myself. Sometimes I wonder if this is why I'm single, which may seem a strange thing to wonder in the face of such things, but I can't help it. Perhaps my torch carrying gets old, and is too much to handle. Who knows?

I want to change the world. I want to change it for the better. I'm glad I started when I did, but I wish I had started sooner.

The reigning champeen!

I did it. I duckfaced. I'm not proud of what I've become.

I miss the long hair already. I'll have it back in two weeks, but for now, I miss it. My hair feels so thin and boring and short, and I hate it. I hate it so much.

I went out and took some photos today with Derek. The light was awfully beautiful, but we were on the wrong side of the mountain for it.

I have a photo shoot scheduled for the 18th, and I have the wedding next month. I'm hoping something comes in between the dates. I couldn't really spare the time, but I'd find a way to make it work.

I've thought about switching my major....AGAIN....to photography. Because why the fuck not? But then I realized I can market myself as a photographer and still get an actual degree, and learn photography tricks as I go along. I've already gotten so much better. When I was in Glenwood last weekend, sitting in my hotel room and drinking and enjoying a lovely evening in a hotel room that smelled like a colon, I went through my old photos from when I first started shooting again, all the way up to now. I've gotten SO much better. I am not as good as I'd like to be, but I believe I've far exceeded the hopes I had for this point in my hobby. I'm excited to see where I'll be two years from now.

I went through and added up how much it would cost if I got every single lens I want, and the new camera I want. For a paltry 16K, I could have the exact set up I want (minus things like reflectors and flashes and other not terribly necessary accessories). I'm seriously considering hooking, just to get the things I want.

I wish I had discovered I was good at a less expensive thing. Like drug addiction. Or identity theft.

Clay pigeons are fuckers

When my bunny Bunny died, I was absolutely wrecked. I cried for days. I had only had her for a little over a week, but I had grown fiercely attached to her. While she was predominantly mine, I saw her as belonging to both me AND Dan. She was Ours, and that meant everything to me. Dan and I didn't really have anything together. We pretty much lived separate lives in his world, if that makes any sense. So when he got me Bunny, I didn't just love her as a pet, I loved her as a symbol. She died just a few days before Dan went off to Afghanistan, and I had been counting on having her to make Dan being gone easier. Her death didn't go smoothly for me.

I suppose that's as good an introduction to this as any, really. I get very attached to my pets. Mostly because I believe my pets love me, and I love them. Love doesn't come easily for me, and I'm not very good at it with people. I always fuck it up somehow, by virtue of being myself. I'm a bit of a fuck up. And you know, my pets don't care. I have a cat named Galouli, and I've had her for almost ten years. I love her dearly. She greets me with purrs and meows and rubs when I come home, and she sleeps with me at night, generally right on my stomach where it's the most uncomfortable. But my guts don't care, and neither do I. I love her company, and she loves mine. Allen has a cat named Spectre, and Spectre has become more my cat in the last couple of years than his. He's still her person of preference, but she sleeps with me now. Right at my head, curled up under my chin or somewhere that is also deeply uncomfortable. I love my kitties. I spoil them as often as I can, and I talk to them because I'm single and crazy, and my god, do I love stereotypes.

I also had six rats.

I started out with Brisby. I bought him a month or two into Dan's deployment, and I loved him HARD. Brisby and I seriously did everything together. I would open his cage, and he would come up to my shoulder, curl up in my hoodie, and hang out with me as I cleaned the house, or watched TV, or sometimes, when I took walks. He would run across my shoulders, chitter in my ear, run back into my hoodie, and I loved him. I spoiled him rotten, too. I gave him fruits and veggies and popcorn as treats, and we were great pals. When he looked lonely, I got him Andes. And Andes was just as good a pal, but not nearly as favored as Brizz. After Andes came Charlie and Figaro, and then Spike and Templeton. My rats have a huge house, with three stories, and all kinds of goodies. I spoil them just as hard as I spoil my cats.

A few months ago, I went to let my boys out for the afternoon, and Brizz didn't run up onto my shoulder. He stayed in his corner. I knew something was wrong, so I picked him up, closed the cage, and sat with my big fat Brizz. He was normally incredibly active, but this time, he just laid with me. I knew he was going to die, and I was a mess. I wept for hours while I cuddled and loved on my rat. Eventually, I put him in a box with one of my shirts, put the box next to me, and I sang to my rat until he died. I cried and cried and cried, and I cried off and on for about a week.

After that, I bonded with Andes. He became my new buddy, and while he didn't replace my Brizz, he certainly buddied up with me. His favorite thing to do was bother the cats, and then come lay under my chin after he got worn out from all of the bothering.

I lost Figaro next. Figaro died while I was busy in a hospital with a broken arm. Allen didn't notice.

My other boys have been perfectly healthy, until two weeks ago. I noticed that Andes was becoming sluggish, and not nearly as interested in being a hilariously small cat bully.

Rats don't live very long, maybe three years. Five, if you're really lucky and buy from a solid breeder. But that's a stretch, no matter how well you take care of them.

Andes is my handsome old boy, and he's been deteriorating over the last two days.

I didn't have any pictures of me and Brizz when he was healthy and happy. I have a picture of him in my arms the day he died, and I keep it on my phone. I still miss him a great deal, so I look at it from time to time. It's the same with Andes. I have one picture of him on my shoulder, hiding in my hair.

I spent most of the night with Andes after I got out of class. I took a picture of us on the couch. Don't mind my face, it's puffy and red because I've been crying all night with my favorite boy.

He's been quietly letting me love on him all night, and I've been crying into his fur and snuggling him as gently as I can. I don't think he's going to be alive in the morning, and it breaks my heart that I can't stay up with him all night and be with him when he dies, if my hunch is correct.

I'm sure this seems silly. He's just a rat, after all.

But he's mine, and I love him, and he's never been just a rat to me. He's my furry little guy, and he's been a source of great comfort for me. It's almost time for my tawny old man to die, and I am going to miss him immeasurably.

Like I said, my love for people doesn't come often or easily, and when it comes, it stays forever. The only difference with my love of my animals is how instantaneous it is. The second I have an animal and it's my critter, I love it. And I love it forever.

I still miss Bunny. I still miss Brisby. And I am devastated over the looming loss of Andes. I'm having a drink and crying while I write this. I set Andes up a comfortable box nest in his house. Charlie and Bullet have been sitting by it since I put it in the house. Cal me crazy, but I think animals are just as compassionate and aware as people are. Andes is their family, and they're going to be as sad as I am when he goes.

Well. There it is.

I'm going to go drunkenly cry on my couch, and hopefully I get some sleep tonight.